There’s no doubting Will Power’s ability. He came into Sunday’s race as the IndyCar points leader, after all. Consistently, he’s the fastest man in the sport. The Australian has raced 131 times in the series, and in 34 of those races, he started from the pole.

He has the name. He has the speed. He has the look. He can be, very easily, the biggest star in IndyCar.

You just have to wonder, sometimes, what he’s thinking.

Sunday’s Pocono IndyCar 500 Fueled by Sunoco at Pocono Raceway turned into one of those times for Power, who finished 10th in a race he started second. A race which he spent the early going dominating. A race in which he didn’t wreck or didn’t have any mechanical problems of note. Races at Pocono, no matter whether it’s the NASCAR series or IndyCar, are so often determined by the strongest cars getting out in front of the pack, staying there and pulling away. This is a story about a dominant car that, somehow, went backwards. This is a story that mirrors the big moments of Powers career.

On lap 167, Power was leading. But eventual race winner Juan Pablo Montoya was charging. Going into Turn 1, Montoya had the speed, the angle, the spot, and other racers might have given it to him. After all, that’s part of racing: accepting when you’re beat and knowing where you can get those spots back.

Not Power. He tried to block Montoya, far later than he should have. He made contact with the left front wing of Montoya’s ride, knocking it loose. Montoya completed the pass for the lead, and somehow — in a sport that frowns on such aggressive blocking — Power wasn’t penalized.

He wouldn’t be so lucky next time.

Move forward to lap 171. Power was challenged for his position by veteran Helio Castroneves. Again, he decided to do his best to impede Castroneves’ progress, jerking from the top of the track on the front straightaway to the bottom, forcing Castroneves to pull way back on the throttle and slow down or risk damaging the car.

“We were just racing hard,” Castroneves said. “What happens on the track stays on the track, and we were racing hard. ... At the end of the day, I have no hard feelings. I would do something different, probably. But I don’t think there are hard feelings.”

This time, IndyCar didn’t sit by. They reviewed the incident and determined Power would have to serve a drive-through penalty for blocking. That means, while the rest of his competitors were blowing through the course at more than 220 mph, Power had to cruise down pit road at a less-than-brisk 60 before he could rejoin them.

With less than 20 laps to go, that made the difference between a solid finish and a middle-of-the-pack result.

Making it even worse, Montoya and Castroneves have more in common than just being among the sport’s biggest starts.

They’re Power’s teammates, guys who work with him to help him when they can and expect the favor returned.

“I actually let him go and went wide on the brakes and touched the brakes,” Power said during a rambling postrace statement that offered little clarity to what actually went through his mind. “I was heading that way, heading over and over and over. I mean, he is my teammate. So, it was another penalty, another drive-through and another really good opportunity lost.”

For a guy who talks often about preferring the anonymity of a quietly successful race over being a mega star, he always seems to find himself sweating under the spotlight. Most often, because he puts himself there.

There will be a segment of fans who defend Power. He was defending his position, and that’s part of racing, and he’s likely correct in his assertion that he has been blocked by others who have escaped penalty. That’s racing, after all.

But racing is also not running every lap like it’s the final one of the Indianapolis 500. It’s picking spots and making runs and giving something now to get something later. Power simply has trouble picking his spots.

Already this season, he has been part of three incidents that have put him in IndyCar’s doghouse. He has had a pair of bumps with Frenchman Simon Pagenaud, one of which sent Pagenaud spinning into a tire barrier April 13 in Long Beach. Later, he punted Josef Newgarden at Belle Isle, causing a sizeable wreck.

Wrecks happen. That’s racing, too. But when you have so many incidents from such a talented a driver, one who has finished second, second, second and fourth in the championship standings the past four seasons, you wonder if he’s racing too hard or doing too much.

This is the fifth straight season Power can conceivably win the championship. He entered the day in the points lead, and he ended it tied with the seasoned Castroneves. He’s tied now because he finished 10th. He’d still be leading if he finished where he should have — in the top five, easily. He’d have finished where he should have if he just raced smarter.

But he didn’t, and unfortunately, that has been the story of Will Power’s season. A Pocono story best summed up by his own frustrated words.

Another really good opportunity lost.

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